The 2005 Sun Bowl marked UCLA’s last 10-win season, and just the seventh in school history. It also springboarded the reputations of two of the team’s lesser-known youngsters.

On that 56-degree El Paso Friday, Brandon Breazell and Kahlil Bell combined for four of the Bruins’ seven touchdowns against Northwestern — the former on a pair of onside kick returns, and the latter on two of his season-high 19 carries.

Bell, then a freshman tailback, was named Sun Bowl co-MVP: “It was the first time people actually realized I could play ball at the Division I level.”

Both were rated two-star recruits by Rivals.com, with Bell receiving just one scholarship offer. Buried on the depth chart behind sophomore Chris Markey and unanimous All-American Maurice Jones-Drew, he had just 33 carries heading into the Sun Bowl. Days before the game, he had called his father with concerns about playing time.

But after Jones-Drew injured his shoulder in the first half, the load fell on Markey and Bell as they combined for 286 rushing yards. On his fourth carry of the game, Bell put the Bruins on the scoreboard and started their run back from a 22-0 deficit. He finished with another score and 136 yards, a total he eclipsed only twice more at UCLA.

Breazell’s end-zone trips served as the daggers: a 42-yard return with 2:24 left on the clock, and a 45-yard return with 18 seconds left to cap the 50-38 win.

On his first touchdown, he’d ignored calls from the sideline to hit the ground and help run out the clock, annoying head coach Karl Dorrell. His teammates were far more forgiving.

“I think (Dorrell) did get mad, but what else are you supposed to do?” recalls former safety Chris Horton, now a UCLA coaching intern. “The ball comes right to you and there’s no one in front of you. ‘And I’m fast, so go score.’ It was pretty cool.”

The man himself does feel a bit slighted in the years since. He’s still recognized around his hometown, but believes his achievement has been otherwise forgotten.

“People celebrated it for maybe 10 minutes after the game,” Breazell says, “I’ve known for being the guy who scored two touchdowns on (onside kick) returns around my town in Fresno.

“But as far as UCLA, if you go to UCLA, there’s nothing in the Hall of Fame, the football room, with ‘two touchdowns, Brandon Breazell.’ There’s nothing like that. That’s what means the most. My school representing for me because I represented for them.”

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At the same time, he says he wouldn’t change anything about his college career — except work harder in the weight room, where he admits he “kind of slacked off” in trying to bulk up a lithe 6-foot, 162-pound frame.

After going undrafted in 2008, Breazell went to Kansas City on a promised $10,000 signing bonus. He only lasted a couple of days before the Chiefs decided that his shoulder, which had a history of popping out, wasn’t worth the risk.

He never saw the money, and after a tryout with the CFL’s Edmonton Eskimos turned fruitless — they were looking for someone bigger — he eventually went back home.

He is currently a wide receivers coach at his alma mater, Edison High, and is hoping for a shot to move up the ladder elsewhere. He keeps tabs on UCLA players, especially those that now don his old No. 1 jersey.

Bell clings on to the NFL dream, his journeyman’s career having bounced from Minnesota to Chicago to New York to Green Bay. He watches every UCLA game he can, proud as ever of his younger brother Darius — a senior receiver who will end his career in the Sun Bowl. And he’s enjoying the company of Packers teammates Datone Jones and Johnathan Franklin, Bruins who were drafted a year ago.

“For the first time in a long time,” Bell says, “it’s really exciting to be a Bruin.”